Helping the young with broken front tooth smile again

Transplant procedure uses patient's own teeth to replace one lost through injury, accident

- Judith Tan

Front teeth play a crucial role in aesthetics and self-confidence, and losing one through a sports injury or accident can be devastating, especially to a teenager.

It was not surprising that student Angela Chin, 19, did not have the confidence to smile with all her teeth showing until May 2023.

Miss Chin was 10 when she fell and broke her front tooth on a concrete floor.

"It fell out and I was rushed to CGH (Changi General Hospital), where it was placed back," she said, adding that she never returned to the hospital for follow-up treatment to ensure the health of the tooth did not worsen.

It was seven years later, in 2022, that she went to the National Dental Centre Singapore (NDCS) to schedule a tooth transplant to replace her bad front tooth. That was on top of an orthodontic treatment - using braces to straighten her teeth.

"(But) in early 2023, my bad front tooth lost its joint and got shaky. We had to do the surgery as soon as possible. It was plucked out before the autotransplant was carried out, and I had to live with a missing tooth for two months," she said.

Miss Chin said she was teased by friends in school, and though she took it in her stride, it made her more determined to have the dental autotransplant done.

A dental autotransplant is a procedure in which dentists move a tooth, usually a premolar, from one location in the mouth to another.